Aftermath (Pricefield)
by hellapricefielder
Summary: After Arcadia Bay is destroyed by the tornado, Max and Chloe drive off together, unsure of what they've left behind. The discovery of some odd photographs leads them onto another mystery.
1. Chapter 1

"Holy _shit_ , Chloe!" Max exclaimed, leaping from the truck and grinning widely. "This. Is. Epic!"

Chloe smirked proudly at the eager girl, "Yeah, isn't it?"

They were standing together on a large hill. The sun was beginning to set on the horizon, and Max stood to watch it while Chloe grabbed their bag from the back of the truck. Max turned around at the sound of the small thump that the bag made on the dirt.

"Cold?" Chloe asked Max later, once the sun had set and the two were huddled in the truck.

The brunette shrugged a little. "Bit. But I'm good. You're here after all."

After a few moments Chloe got out of the car for a smoke, leaving Max to her thoughts.

 _So we got out of Arcadia. But we don't know who lived, and who… didn't. But I saved Chloe. And that god-awful rewind power is out of our lives._

Chloe had climbed back into the car and her slamming the door behind her in typical Chloe fashion startled Max from her thoughts.

"Maxie?" she asked, "You good?"

"Hmm? Fine." Max nodded, "Just thinking."

"What about?" the bluenette questioned curiously.

"Life. This situation." Max shrugged, cupping her elbows and hugging her arms close to her body as she buried her feelings. Chloe had suffered enough. She didn't need to hear these thoughts.

"Max," Chloe pressed her. "Hey. You can tell me anything."

"It's really not anything, Chlo," Max promised the other teen. "If it was a big deal I would let you know. I'm just dwelling."

Chloe let the subject drop and sat in silence. "Get some sleep, Maxie. I'll keep driving for a bit."

The next morning, Max was driving the truck and Chloe was passed out in the backseat. The sun was rising and Max let out a yawn, wondering how on earth she was able to see the sunset and sunrise in the same day and not be totally exhausted.

Birds started to chirp outside and Chloe groaned sleepily. Max glanced at her in the mirror. "Morning Chlo. Did you sleep alright?"

Chloe grumbled, "Shut up, Caulfield."

Max smiled to herself. _She's adorable_ , she thought, going back in her mind to the moment they'd first left Arcadia Bay.

 _Chloe and Max sat in silence in the truck, leaving the destroyed Arcadia behind them. Chloe drove, staring numbly forwards._

" _Max," she murmured after a moment, "Rachel… she's really gone."_

 _The other girl nodded, "Yeah she is." She reached over and gently rested a hand on Chloe's shoulder. The blue-haired girl didn't react, but didn't push Max away either. "She's gone, but we won't forget her. And we'll keep on living because she would've wanted you to." Max could see that Chloe was on the edge of a breakdown._

 _Chloe nodded softly, watching the road and gripping the wheel. "Can we stop? Just for a minute?"_

" _Of course, Chlo. Pull over," Max said reassuringly._

" _Hey Max?" Chloe asked as she got out of the car. "Can… Can I have a hug?" Her voice shook and she sounded sheepish._

 _Max could swear she felt her heart break for her friend. She hopped out of the truck and pulled her into a hug. She felt Chloe's shoulders shake and rubbed her back, letting her break down and cry in her arms._

 _It took awhile for Chloe to calm down, and when she did, she was pale and drained. Max gently fixed Chloe's hair. "Come on, I'll drive for awhile."_

 _Chloe managed a weak smile. "Great. Also, you give hella good hugs,"_

 _Max smiled back, glad to see a bit of the old Chloe back._

 _As they moved to get back in the truck, Chloe had grabbed Max's hand and pulled her back. She wrapped an arm across Max's shoulders and pulled her in close, placing a gentle kiss on the brunette's lips._

Max was pulled back to reality by a click from the backseat. She looked at Chloe in the rearview mirror. "Open the window if you're going to smoke in here," she said. Chloe flipped her off but complied. Max chuckled a bit and kept driving along.

It took awhile for them to reach another big city. Max looked on her phone to see where they were. They were in Medford, Oregon. "Can we find a cheap hotel?" Max asked Chloe pleadingly. "I'm so tired of sleeping in this damn truck."

"Of course we can, Maxie," Chloe was cheerful and Max suspected her good mood was connected to the vague skunkish scent pervading the truck.

They stayed in Medford for two nights to rest up, then moved on. Chloe drove while Max sat shotgun fiddling with her camera. The brunette suddenly lifted the camera and took a picture of Chloe, who was bobbing her head along to the metalcore CD she'd put on the truck's radio. Chloe's eyes darted over to look at her when she heard the click and Max shook her head at her. "Eyes on the road, Chlo-Chlo."

Chloe gave a grin and looked back at the road. "Y'know Maxie, these pictures don't come free," she teased.

Max rolled her eyes. "You are a real piece of work, Price." She glanced down at the picture that her camera had spit out and noticed there was two pictures there. Shrugging it off, she tucked both pictures into her bag without glancing at them. It wasn't unusual for her camera to accidentally hand out a blank picture when she took one, especially if it had been a while.

"Hey, Maxi-Pad, lemme see that picture," Chloe said, stopping at a stop sign on the deserted road.

"Got it," Max smiled and reached into her bag, grabbing the picture off the top and handing it to her.

Chloe looked at the picture. "Max, I didn't know your camera had a timer!" she said eagerly, grinning.

"What? It doesn't, why?" Max was dumbfounded.

"Look at this." Chloe showed her the picture. It was the two of them standing on the hill where they'd been a few days before, looking like it was taken from the truck.

Max stared, eyes bugging out of her head. "Chloe… I didn't take that picture. I didn't touch my camera that whole night."


	2. Chapter 2

Chloe stayed silent, staring at the picture of the two. Max was glad the road was empty, because if it hadn't been, they would've backed up a lot of traffic by then.

Just as Chloe started to drive again, the radio host started to give a news bulletin. The station was becoming staticky, but Max turned the volume up so they could hear.

"- great disaster in the nearby town of Arcadia Bay last Friday-" the radio host said before being cut off by static. The eyes of both girls went wide and they listened closely. "-several survivors found and currently unidentified-" Chloe looked hopeful. "-scientists and meteorologists still unsure of what caused it-" The station cut out to complete static and Chloe looked eager. "Maxie! They found survivors! Do you think maybe-"

Max cut her off with a raised hand. "Maybe. But they said unidentified. We have no idea who they are."

Chloe's mood hardly looked affected. "Yeah, I know. But we can hope, right?"

"Of course," Max gave a reassuring smile.

A week later, the girls were starting to feel desperate. Their money was dwindling fast, between the cost of gas and food and the hotels they tended to stay at when they were in the cities. The truck was also taking a beating and Chloe could tell it would need repairs soon. She was driving while Max slept in the backseat, curled up under a blanket.

Max woke as Chloe pulled into the parking lot of a small, dusty convenience store.

"Mm?" she murmured, sitting up and yawning. "What're we stopping for? I'm still sleepy…"

Chloe smiled. "Snack break. And I need to piss. I think it's a good idea you come too, we probably won't hit another stop for awhile and I don't think you'd be a fan of pissing in the grass at the side of the road."

Max wrinkled her nose. "Hell no."

"Exactly, Caulfield. Now let's go." Chloe hopped out of the truck. Max begrudgingly followed, covering her mouth as she yawned. Chloe smiled a little and opened the door to the small store, heading inside with Max.

After their break, they headed back into the car with their snacks. Max sat shotgun beside Chloe with a bag of chips between them. This time Max had control of the radio since they'd only had Chloe's punk rock music for awhile. The brunette put on a CD and Chloe shook her head a little. "Your music is pure hipster trash-"

"Oh shut up. It's meaningful and not just all bass and electric guitar," Max replied, quietly singing along to the indie song.

Chloe considered retaliation but just listened to Max's soulful voice blend with the CD that the brunette had put on, vaguely entranced by her voice as she drove along. A few minutes later Max's voice faded out. Chloe glanced over to see what it was, to see the other girl asleep and leaning on the window of the truck. A smile appeared on the bluenette's face as she grabbed the blanket from the backseat and draped it over Max.

 **A/N: sorry about the hella short length of this chapter! I just wanted some adorable pricefield fluff before things get too dramatic for our favourite girls.**


	3. Chapter 3

Max and Chloe were driving along as usual. Singing along to the radio as they went along and holding hands. Chloe was in the passenger's seat and Max was behind the wheel, driving at a fast pace down the empty road in Middle-Of-Nowhere, Oregon. Another car slammed on the brakes in front of them. "Chloe?!" she shouted, panicked. "What-?" Suddenly the truck slammed into the car and glass sprayed into their faces.

"Max!" Chloe said loudly, causing the girl to sit up sharply, panting.

"Oh my god, Chloe…" Max rubbed her eyes. "I just had the worst dream."

"I thought you'd had another vision," Chloe said, sounding relieved. "Want to talk about it?"

Max shrugged. "No reason to. Just a nightmare. I'm probably stressed out."

"What is there to stress about? We're fine."

"Our lives are falling apart, Chloe. Our town is destroyed, we're running low on supplies with no plan at all. This is bad. Not to mention whatever happened with that picture," Max sighed and looked at the floor of the truck.

Chloe rested a hand on Max's shoulder. "It's okay, Max. I get it. We're going to be okay."

"But no, Chloe. Please, take something seriously for once."

Chloe looked like she'd just been slapped across the face. Max felt a twinge of guilt for the comment but forged on anyways. "This is serious. At some point the truck is going to break, or run out of gas, or we'll be out of money, or food, or something. We need to make a plan, what are we going to do? We can't just road trip forever."

Chloe didn't respond for awhile. It wasn't until Max heard her sniff that her eyes widened and all her stress and anger melted, replaced by guilt. "Oh my lord, Chloe, I'm so sorry," she said, wrapping her arms around the other female. "I'm a total ass. I didn't mean to make you feel bad, I'm so sorry."

"It's fine. I'm just overreacting," Chloe murmured, wiping her eyes. "You're right. We do need a plan."

Max nodded a little, "Do you want to find a hotel for tonight and we can talk about where we're going for now?"

Chloe agreed and then turned the radio up as her favourite song came on.

That night they sat in a motel room, flipping through the channels on the TV. Max rested her head on Chloe's shoulder and looked up at her. "So. Plan-making."

Chloe smiled down at her. "What do you think of New York?"

Max shrugged, "We've been heading parallel to it the whole time. It's across the country."

"Fair enough. How about… Vegas? We could go to Nevada."

Max laughed. "Chlo. Nevada? Seriously? There's literally nothing there but Vegas and drunk frat boys."

Chloe laughed as well, "Fair enough. Hm… want to go back to Seattle?"

"I'm not against it but we've been going the opposite direction this whole time. What about… Los Angeles?"

Chloe froze up. "No," she whispered.

"Oh… right. I'm sorry I mentioned it Chlo." Max sighed and hugged her.

"Not your fault. Let's just… get some sleep." She turned off the TV.

Max nodded and laid down with Chloe, snuggling her closely. The two dozed off quickly, tired from travelling.

The next morning, Max woke up first and smiled at Chloe, who looked absolutely gorgeous in her sleep. She slid out of bed without waking the blue-haired female and grabbed her camera off the desk, taking a picture of Chloe. When the picture came out, another came with it and her heart sank. She picked it up, studying it, and her eyes widened. It was a picture of her and Chloe asleep together, snuggling closely.


End file.
